


let others wage war: you, happy Austria, marry

by thatdarkhairedgirl



Category: Sound of Music (1965), The Sound of Music - Rodgers/Hammerstein/Lindsay & Crouse
Genre: F/M, Honeymoon, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-25
Updated: 2014-02-25
Packaged: 2018-02-14 02:38:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2174988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatdarkhairedgirl/pseuds/thatdarkhairedgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Do you think,” she begins again, “That things would have remained the same between us if you had married the Baroness, instead?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	let others wage war: you, happy Austria, marry

**Author's Note:**

> Title is a translation from Ovid, often attributed to the Hapsburgs: _bella gerant alii, tu felix Austria nube_. Prompt from **watername** : "The Sound of Music - Captain/Maria. There never was a Baroness."

The bridal suite is grand, larger than the master bedroom in their home and finer still in all its silk and splendor; she has come far from the small village in the Alps, the simple cloister in the Abbey, the governess’s room beside the nursery. Maria stirs, reaching out from the warm coverlet she’s wrapped in only to find empty space, cool mattress, and there is a moment where her heart seems to skip a beat inside her chest; it is a momentary fear, cruel and fleeting, that the past months have been a dream. It is for naught: Maria sits upright in her bridal bed and Georg is sitting in a chair at the terrace window, a breakfast tray on the small table beside him, and looks like he has been resting there for some time. Maria nearly laughs; his body is well-regimented, wound as tightly as his favorite watch – not even the promise of a honeymoon would allow her husband to rest longer than he needs.

 _My husband_ , she thinks, and she bites her tongue to keep her smile at bay. _My **husband**_.

“There is tea,” Georg says, and he sets his own cup aside, motions toward the one waiting at her bedside table. “Milk, no sugar. That is how you take it, yes?”

Maria relaxes against the headboard and smoothes down the covers around her, reaches for her tea – it is sweet, but not overly so. She is unsurprised that he remembers; even before, amidst their military whistles and strict, exacting discipline, the Captain still knew that Kurt cannot abide the taste of pears, that Gretl cannot sleep without a candle burning. Even with seven children, one remembers. The light coming in through the windows is cool and bright: the shadows of the room are dissipating, the colors are growing richer, warmer. Maria sips her tea. At this hour, her hair must look a disaster.

“Do you think,” she starts, and at the faltering shake of her head Georg rises from his chair and comes toward the bed. Maria sets her tea back to the side. “Do you think,” she begins again, “That things would have remained the same between us if you had married the Baroness, instead?”

Georg turns back the blankets as he sinks back into the space beside her; he tilts his head slightly, studying her, and Maria feels a thrill run through her as she remembers the shape he makes in the dark. “How do you mean?”

“Our repartee.” Maria turns toward him and their knees brush beneath their shared bedcovers. “She was frightened of it, was she not? I may be a rather ingenuous soul, but even I could see she was intent on keeping me locked in the nursery with the children, if she planned on keeping me at all.”

Georg doesn’t answer right away, and Maria isn’t sure if she is grateful or not for his silence until she feels his fingertips brush over the nape of her neck, tracing down along the line of her spine. He leans in closer and her breath catches, his lips are warm where they press against her shoulder, right at the place where it meets her neck. “It would not have mattered,” he says, his voice falling into the low, almost tender tone it seems to become whenever they are alone, now. “There has _never_ been a baroness who could match the likes of you.”

He holds her gaze and Maria feels the familiar flash of affection spark up in her heart, flickering out through the spaces between her ribs. She promised herself to God and married a man instead, and even as her mouth meets his she knows that this was the path she was meant to take, that this is where her heart truly lies. Georg cups her face in his hands and she laughs against his mouth.

They fall, together, into the bed.


End file.
